Comments on: Show and Tell: Progress Tracking

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 00:41:24 +0000

Ahh that works too :)

By: Joelle Wilson

Joelle Wilson — Sat, 23 Jul 2011 00:13:33 +0000

I usually have the chapter word counts on small post it notes that I stick to my wall. But for August I'm making a spreadsheet just to do something different.

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 21:28:09 +0000

Thanks for the link! I like having both: a larger monthly, and a more compact version, to track deadlines and time between drafts etc. I think I may just print that out ;)

By: David D Sharp

David D Sharp — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 21:07:07 +0000

That's super organised and you're maintaining an almost perfect level of efficiency that I can only dream off. Also I think you print your calendars of from the same site I used to use, however I now go for less detail but a bigger picture and use David Seah's compact calendar: http://davidseah.com/compact-calendar/

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 06:06:59 +0000

That works! Pretty much what I did with my edits... not the month in the photo (which was a later round of revisions, so it involved multiple chapters per day), but other months :)

By: John Wiswell

John Wiswell — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 02:22:27 +0000

I'm in revisions on my novel at present. I chart the progress quite simply: one chapter per day, unless it's a very short chapter. If it's a very long one that needs splitting up, I'll handle all the resulting divided chapters. It's worked so far!

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:56:23 +0000

Hehe whatever works for you! And thanks :)

By: Brownpaperbaggirl

Brownpaperbaggirl — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:46:22 +0000

I don't track my writing progress...ops? Haha. I think its brilliant however that you track yours!

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 20:16:00 +0000

Wow you've done some massive shaving! 3k and 2k from a single scene :) That's impressive. I like how you track which days you remove and which days you add. I've found that my word counts stay pretty stable, adding from one place, and subtracting from another overall. Hehe I'd say you're pretty well organized! Whatever works :)

By: Tiyana

Tiyana — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 19:44:30 +0000

I love the use of color! Very clear. I'm actually using a spreadsheet right now, also with using color. I guess I can put it up on Photobucket and share, heh. Here. Basically, I note the chapter number and name then the scenes I'm working on, followed by the date(s); previous scene name (if I renamed it); the old chapter word count; words edited on a particular day or set of days (I try to keep everything grouped by scenes, so it just depends); the new word count; how many words I was able to shave off the old word count; comments; and finally two columns to keep track of general weekly goals. Also at the bottom (it's cut off) I track the total original word count that I've gone through, total new word count, and total words shaved. A new week (or more like "working segment") is indicated by a grey background, though I was initially irregular about considering seven days a week; like I said earlier, it just depends on if I'm still in the middle of a scene or chapter or not. (In my head it makes sense, though it may not necessarily make sense to others looking at it, lol.) Also, I highlight the blocks in the "Words Shaved" column red if they go up and green if they go down as an indicator of my pattern of wordage. *sighs* It's working alright, though I could probably improve it some by starting a new row for each day. However, I prefer to think in terms of scenes or chapters completed, not by how many words I got done on any one day. It's semi-organized chaos, for sure, haha.

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 18:55:14 +0000

Ahh that has been a while :)

And that is me, actually. Makes it easy to flip to the current day I'm working on in my notebook (it's half chomped at this point) hehe

By: Anthony Lee Collins

Anthony Lee Collins — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 18:40:17 +0000

I track my writing progress by posting as I write, so I guess that tell me some things. (I had no idea that it had been nearly four years since I'd touched the WIP until I looked at the dates.) I never track day-by-day.

I'm a bit concerned about the upper left hand corner of your pages, BTW. It looks like somebody has taken a chomp out of your notebook. :-)

By: T. S. Bazelli

T. S. Bazelli — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 16:06:42 +0000

hehe actually that is because I have two different brands of pink highlighter, and to my disappointment, they just don't seem to want to run out! (I'm angling for a nice blue or green next time around - not that there's anything wrong with pink). I'll have a chunk of days off soon though, don't you worry ;)

By: Stephen A. Watkins

Stephen A. Watkins — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 15:14:42 +0000

Heh, you know how I am currently tracking my writing progress. Methinks you're running out of pink, however, based on that snapshot of July. The last few days are looking decidely less vibrant in color... You better take a few days off so you can conserve your highlighter ;)